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Share this Story: David Staples: Green activists finally admit that green power is polluting and inefficient

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The green movement is getting a much-needed wake-up call.

Some of its most prominent members have become whistleblowers and heretics. They’re calling attention to the dirty reality that few environmentalists will acknowledge, that green energy such as solar and wind are inefficient and unreliable when it comes to creating energy, and they’re also heavily polluting, resource and land-intensive, and backed by aggressive and scheming billionaires.

David Staples: Green activists finally admit that green power is polluting and inefficientBack to video

Two weeks ago, activist documentary maker Michael Moore — a hero of the political left for his attacks on everything from former U.S president George W. Bush to the evils of globalization and capitalism — released on YouTube his new documentary, Planet of the Humans. The film spells out the downside of wind and solar power and biofuels.

Green energy lobbyists have howled in protest since then. A week ago, Justin Trudeau associate and green energy power broker Gerald Butts took to Twitter to denigrate the documentary: “Hopefully, Michael Moore’s Planet of the Humans will go down as the last wheezing gasp of climate denialism. It’s a sad turn for Moore’s career.”

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But as of today, it has had more than six million views. It’s hardly a wheezing gasp. Instead it’s a sermon powered by righteous wrath, made all the more credible and compelling because it comes from Moore and director Jeff Gibbs, former true believers in the mystical promise of harnessing the power of the wind and the sun to heal the planet.

“I think it’s having a huge impact,” says North America’s leading public intellectual on clean energy, Michael Shellenberger, of the film.

Green industry lobbyists are right to be alarmed, Shellenberger says. “It’s coming at a time when governments are going to have to choose whether they’re going to continue to waste taxpayers’ money on subsidies for renewables or not, and I just think it’s going to tip a lot of governments into ending those subsidies.”

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I’m not going to argue that every detail in this latest Moore film is completely fair and accurate. It’s not. Nonetheless, fair-minded observers of the world energy scene, from California-based Shellenberger, a former adviser to President Barack Obama on clean energy, to Calgary-based energy analyst Peter Tertzakian, hail the film.

The film fails to show the benefits of roof top solar power in a city setting, Tertzakian says in his ARC Energy podcast, but he is OK with that shortcoming.

The film shocks with images of reckless deforestation for bio-fuels, strip mining for rare metals used in solar, and great tracts of landed needed for mass solar facilities. “There’s no question the movie cherry-picked the worst of, but sometimes you need to do that to wake people up,” Tertzakian says.

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“It really says what I’ve been saying for a long time, that nothing in the world of energy comes for free, comes without any environmental consequence…I do think that sometimes you need to whack people over the head to show them this concept… I think the environmental movement has really portrayed an image of green energy being a panacea for endless amounts of cheap, free, clean energy. But I think the movie makes that point quite well, that there is no panacea.”

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A common critique is that the documentary doesn’t account for all the new and improved solar, wind and battery technology. But Shellenberger points out this new tech is only marginally better than the old. For example, the efficiency of most used silicon crystalline solar cell panels has improved by just two per cent in the last 10 years. Solar and wind farms still gobble up huge quantities of land and manufacturing resources.

The documentary is profoundly and unnecessarily pessimistic. It argues humanity must radically cut its numbers and its energy use. Shellenberger, whose new book Apocalpyse Never comes out on June 30, doesn’t believe that doom is upon us. Instead, he pushes for nuclear energy, a reliable, high-powered, low-carbon energy source.

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Nuclear isn’t mentioned in the film, but Shellenberger says he’s largely happy with the doc. “At least somebody finally acknowledges the elephant in the room, which is that renewables are energy dilute and they have huge environmental impacts.”

Some greens have pushed for Moore, Gibbs and their production partners to retract the film and apologize for it. “It’s revealing that the impulse has been towards censorship,” Shellenberger says of these green activists. “Why not just debate? It’s because they’re afraid of it obviously.”

But green energy movement is indeed right to be alarmed. Like nothing else before it, Moore’s documentary reveals its dirty secret to those who most need to hear it.

Share this Story: David Staples: Green activists finally admit that green power is polluting and inefficient

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